This morning I enjoyed a trifecta of articles that piqued my monkey brain. Incidentally, I thought “trifecta” meant “trio,” but in fact its primary meaning has to do with horse racing.
Anyway. The first piece, from Harvard Business Review (HBR), has a title that sums up my life philosophy: The Unimportance of Practically Everything. The operative word here is “practically,” as in, “I practically peed in my pants when I saw Jennifer Garner three feet behind me in the GAP dressing room area.” Note: not the same as “literally” or “virtually.” In other words, my underwear remained safe, and yes, I did see her. She’s very, very pretty.
Anyway, part II. HBR suggests that most things—emails, online articles (oh, the irony!), etc—are more numerous than the truly vital stuff, e.g. money, cats, and video games. We need to shut out most of the noisy information pouring into our brains. That dovetailed nicely with How to be Happy at Work by Inc., which informed me that about 20% of what I do in the office matters. Perfect! I only work about 20% of the time anyway, which means I am 100% productive! Math: it can justify everything.
More importantly, the article told me I am in charge of making myself happy, because I have standards in my head that may or may not be unreasonable. The article suggested that I reflect on what has to happen for me to be (a) happy, and (b) unhappy. I tried out this little exercise and came up with these results:
What has to happen for me to be happy in the office?
What has to happen for me to be unhappy in the office?
Apparently, I’m also supposed to create some new rules to make happiness easy to achieve and unhappiness difficult, but that takes effort, so let’s skip that and move on to the pièce de résistance: The Surprising Secret to Time Management, which I honored by not even reading the article. Is it good? You tell me!
Speaking of not knowing if something is good, last night’s MTV Movie Awards had the distinction of flying by while being boring. I died a little inside every time Kristen Stewart went onstage. Fortunately, Elizabeth Banks redeemed the show by rubbing up against three muscular gentlemen. Then Boyfriend finished playing Diablo III with his brother and asked me to switch to the Celtics vs. Heat game, which went into overtime. Spoiler alert: we won!
Confession time: I also don’t know what this blog post was really about.
Join me next time when I unpeel the Onion of Societal Expectations!
Anyway. The first piece, from Harvard Business Review (HBR), has a title that sums up my life philosophy: The Unimportance of Practically Everything. The operative word here is “practically,” as in, “I practically peed in my pants when I saw Jennifer Garner three feet behind me in the GAP dressing room area.” Note: not the same as “literally” or “virtually.” In other words, my underwear remained safe, and yes, I did see her. She’s very, very pretty.
Anyway, part II. HBR suggests that most things—emails, online articles (oh, the irony!), etc—are more numerous than the truly vital stuff, e.g. money, cats, and video games. We need to shut out most of the noisy information pouring into our brains. That dovetailed nicely with How to be Happy at Work by Inc., which informed me that about 20% of what I do in the office matters. Perfect! I only work about 20% of the time anyway, which means I am 100% productive! Math: it can justify everything.
More importantly, the article told me I am in charge of making myself happy, because I have standards in my head that may or may not be unreasonable. The article suggested that I reflect on what has to happen for me to be (a) happy, and (b) unhappy. I tried out this little exercise and came up with these results:
What has to happen for me to be happy in the office?
- Not get caught reading online articles and then blogging about them.
- Have a fun conversation about Game of Thrones or any pop culture subject.
- Have lunch with my posse.
- Free food!!!
What has to happen for me to be unhappy in the office?
- Only free food available is pizza. sadface
Apparently, I’m also supposed to create some new rules to make happiness easy to achieve and unhappiness difficult, but that takes effort, so let’s skip that and move on to the pièce de résistance: The Surprising Secret to Time Management, which I honored by not even reading the article. Is it good? You tell me!
Speaking of not knowing if something is good, last night’s MTV Movie Awards had the distinction of flying by while being boring. I died a little inside every time Kristen Stewart went onstage. Fortunately, Elizabeth Banks redeemed the show by rubbing up against three muscular gentlemen. Then Boyfriend finished playing Diablo III with his brother and asked me to switch to the Celtics vs. Heat game, which went into overtime. Spoiler alert: we won!
Confession time: I also don’t know what this blog post was really about.
Join me next time when I unpeel the Onion of Societal Expectations!
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